


i love your beautiful anger

by helenecixous



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: F/F, Friends to Lovers, Infidelity, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-02
Updated: 2017-03-02
Packaged: 2018-09-27 22:44:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10055180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helenecixous/pseuds/helenecixous
Summary: You make sure she knows unequivocally that whatever monster she sees when she looks in the mirror doesn’t, and will never, appear to you. You just don’t think she’ll ever believe you, but still she had, a fortnight after the first conversation of this kind, offered you a job.





	

Annalise Keating is a pastel pink sunrise. She's a pitch black nighttime, softened by intermittent moonlight as the winds of change force the clouds onwards. She's a thunderstorm, low and rumbling, and heavy purple clouds designed to suffocate. She's a clear blue sky and an unforgiving heat, she's the raindrops that water the most delicate of flowers, and she's the tornadoes that uproot trees and leave devastation in their wake. She’s something that’s forever shifting, but she’s somehow always constant. She’s  _ right there,  _ but just out of arm’s reach, and if that isn’t just the perfect metaphor for your life, you don’t know what is.

“I love you,” you think when you look at Annalise, and then in the same metaphorical breath, you think, “I hate you.” But you neither love nor hate her; you love the idea of her, and the unspoken promise of devotion between you; and you hate the distance. You hate how she makes you feel - safe and cared for and like you have some sort of chance at one day being the one she goes to sleep next to every night, only to then make sure that you never forget that she’s married. 

 

You’d handled the weeks and months of working under Annalise as one of her Keating Four well, until Annalise had winced and groaned, her hand curling around her stomach protectively, and you had advised her to lie on her side. You had known as soon as your words had tumbled into the space between you both and filled it up that you had made a mistake, and you’d turned to leave before Annalise could voice the questions she was already forming, but she had asked you to stay. “Talk to me,” she’d requested, her tone uncharacteristically soft, and your eyes had stung with sudden tears. You’d sat down opposite her, and your silence had confirmed everything that Annalise had suspected already, about who you had been and what had been done to you, and about all of the things you are and the things you could be, and the things that you won’t ever get the chance to be.

 

From then on, something had shifted between you both. Annalise now shares more smiles with you, more soft conversations about things that aren’t at all work related, and she’d been there to hold your hair back when you’d been shaking and crying and throwing up into the toilet after a particularly triggering case. In turn, you had been there - and still are there - to pick up the pieces when Annalise came home with her husband and without her son, to drive her places, to do practically whatever she asks, and for a while you’d pretended to yourself that your loyalty to her was born from your respect that was constrained by your professional boundaries, and not from the way she can make you blush with one look, nor from the way she’s your last thought before sleep takes you under, and your first thought when you wake up.

 

She’s not a good person, she tells you. She tells anybody who stands still for long enough, anyone who will listen, anyone who looks at her like they don’t absolutely despise the very fabric of her being. “Bonnie,” she says to you, watching you with that cold detachment you guess she perfected years ago. “There is nothing good, or safe, about me.” For a while, you’d fought it. You’d argued with her, tried to get her to see herself how you see her, tried to describe the way she makes you feel - point out the way she makes a  _ living  _ from doing favours for people, but you’d never quite managed to put into words the way her tone surrounds you, the way her smile is enough to make you cry, the way her brief touches linger on your skin for hours after she’s moved away. So instead, you tell her how she helped you, how she saved you, pulled you back from that terrifying edge more effectively than Sam ever had come close to. You make sure she knows unequivocally that whatever monster she sees when she looks in the mirror doesn’t, and will never, appear to you. You just don’t think she’ll ever believe you, but still she had, a fortnight after the first conversation of this kind, offered you a job.

You were to fill the role of assistant, you were told that from day one. Assistant, secretary, lawyer, researcher, murderer. You're to be whatever Annalise needs you to be, and what she needs you to be depends on the day, and on the mood she's in. It’s the kind of work that suits you fine - and she’s the kind of boss who works you ruthlessly, days and nights with limited sleep, she works you up to your barriers and then she pushes you through them, and with each case you win with her, you leave the courthouse feeling renewed, a better person for it. It all suits you fine.

 

She puts you in the office right next to hers, surrounds you with her voice, her perfume, until she’s your only thought. Briefly, you’d acknowledged that this is how cults start, and the pedestal you’d so carefully put her on attests to that. But you don’t have it in you to be worried; there’s a part of you that knows that, on some levels, the only thing that comes between you and her metaphorically taking over the world is her husband. Too many times she’s been working with you, talking to you softly, late in the day with the sun low enough to paint the walls golden, streaking into her house and sliding the world underneath an ambiguous filter, underneath which anything could happen. Too many times she’s been leaning over your shoulder, looking for something in a file you had in your hands, and she’s been close enough that you can feel her breath, her hair against your cheek, her hand on the back of your chair, her breasts and hips practically flush against your side, you’ve felt each dip of her body, each breath she takes, and each time you’ve turned your head just slightly, allowed yourself to study her face in excruciatingly fine detail. The fallout from her eyeshadow, the way her lips are slightly chapped, the way the aureate light frames her, catches her at the edges and warms her, and something in you swells, makes it hard to breathe, hard to think, and you think there’s no way she can’t hear your hummingbird heart in the otherwise silent room.

She always turns to look at you, and there’s always something undefinable in these moments, in her eyes, in the way she offers you a small, quiet smile, and you can never think about anything else. You want to reach out with your trembling hands, cup her jaw, and kiss her so softly that she forgets everything but the sunlight and you, and you’re never sure that she’s not thinking about the same thing. And then, as you’re crawling towards what seems like the inevitable, the front door opens and closes, and Sam comes in. You both shift, she straightens, and you run a hand through your hair, look at nothing but the files until they both leave the room. When you look up again, you notice that the sun’s gone down, and the room is pale and cold.

 

She sees you through your first breakup - some girl you'd not mentioned to her except in passing (and you never stop to think about what that says, because that's a thought that leaves a bad taste in your mouth and a persistent guilt that lingers), and Annalise never asks. She doesn't even ask when she walks in on you crying, joins you on the sofa, opens her arms and quietly offers to have her killed. The ache that's shutting down your entire body is almost worth it, you think, as she runs her fingers slowly through your hair until there's a wet patch on her blue dress from your tears that finally slow, and she tells you that nobody in the world deserves your tears, not even the cute barista who always gets your order right before offering to take you out on a date. And you smile then, hiccup softly and wipe your cheeks. “So you did know about her?” you ask, your voice tired and worn out in the way that happens only when you're done crying.

You hear the smile in her voice as she plays with a lock of your hair, twisting it around her finger absentmindedly. “Of course I did,” she says quietly. “That's my job. And nobody messes around with my person without me knowing about it.”

Her person. It's something you repeat to yourself like a mantra, when she's yelling at you, when she's crying, when it's five am and you've still not managed to fall asleep. You're Annalise’s person, and you don't try dating again after that.

 

You notice that she notices when you start to recede. When things get bad in your head, and you get quieter and you stop eating and get snappy with her students, you catch her watching you more often, and sometimes she pushes you through it - pushes you until you either break, or snap out of it. When it doesn’t work, when you buckle under the combined pressure, she’s immeasurably gentle. She sends you home sometimes, makes you promise her that you’ll get into bed and try for some sleep, makes you promise that you’ll eat and, when she sees that you’re bullshitting her, a delivery guy turns up at your flat with some chinese takeout and tells you that the costs have been covered. You always roll your eyes and reach for your phone to text her, and you always think better of it. It’s unspoken, this thing, something that neither of you have ever tried to address, and you allay your guilt by working harder when you get better, by knowing that she knows that you would do exactly the same if your positions were reversed. It’s something that alleviates the heaviness that sticks to you like tar when you walk into the kitchen to find Sam with his arms around her, his hands on her arms and his lips against hers, or when you watch them both go up to bed, leaving you working alone into the small hours of the night before having to see yourself out. You try to remind yourself that it’s you, not him, who receives her smiles, who can make her laugh, who’s there for her when she’s sick. You wonder sometimes whether he knows her favourite order from the chinese takeout (it’s chow mein and spring rolls), or whether he’s realised yet that when he forgot about her birthday, it was your flat she spent it in.

There’s one thing you are sure about, however - and that’s that he doesn’t know that you love his wife more than he’s capable of loving anything, and that she is completely, utterly wasted with him. It’s this that makes it easy for you to smile at him, even though to you it feels almost feral: this knowledge that even though she doesn’t tell you (doesn’t need to) that while he may be the one sleeping with her, it’s you that she trusts.

 

Sam’s away ‘on a business thing’ when she tells you that he’s screwing a student. It’s so matter-of-fact, so casual, that you look up in surprise, and ask her to repeat it. She’s sitting on the corner of your desk, pushing her cuticles back, and you had been talking about who had worn the best dress at the Oscars (you’d said Octavia Spencer, she’d said Taraji P. Henson) while you’d sifted through witness statement after witness statement for a particularly harrowing case.

“He’s screwing some white kid,” she said, finally looking up from her nails and offering you a small, strange smile. “And he thought I wouldn’t find out.”

“Oh, Annalise,” you breathe, not knowing what to say, not knowing what she wants you to say. “How’d you- who is it?”

She rolls her shoulders in a half hearted attempt at a shrug. “Some student of his. I don’t know her - she’s a psychology major, so why would I?” she laughs now, properly, and your heart is aching for her. She shakes her head, and sighs. “I don’t know if she’s his  _ first _ , but I’m sure the photos of his penis he’s been sending her are a new thing.”

“Does he know you know?” you ask quietly, focusing your gaze on the wall behind her. For some reason the thought of meeting her eyes right now is terrifying - like you’re scared that your twisted relief will be written all over your face and that she’ll hate you for it.

“Probably,” she says. “I guess that serves me right, doesn’t it? For fucking with somebody else’s husband.”

There’s something in her tone that tells you she doesn’t mean that, and you don’t want to read it as relief, but the way she’s looking at you is making you shift in your seat, making your cheeks heat up slowly. “Are you going to - to leave him?”

“No,” she says, and this doesn’t surprise you. “No, I don’t think so. I’m not sure I’d know what to do without him.” Her smile twists a little bit, and she gets down from the desk. “Are you busy tonight?”

“I’m not.”

“Good.” She stretches, and you watch her arms, watch the way her fingers curl and she lets out a soft groan as something in her shoulder pops. “Do you want to stay here? I got a subscription to Netflix and I might as well use it. I’ve got some ice cream too.” Here she pauses, and looks right at you. “Mint chocolate.” It’s your favourite, and you nod, trying to ignore the way your whole body is thrumming, like your blood is electric and charged.

“Of course,” you say softly, and smile, standing.

She invites you upstairs and tells you she’s got some pyjamas around somewhere that should fit you, because, she reasons, if a night like this is worth doing, it’s worth doing properly.

 

From then it becomes something fixed - Sam goes out of town and you stay over and consume your body weight in ice cream. But this time is the fourth or fifth, and it feels different. She invites you to have dinner with her, and she cooks. She cooks filet mignon, which you’ve never had before, and serves it with a wine that even smells expensive. You’re glad you didn’t come over in joggers (which you did last time), and she makes you sit at the table as she puts the finishing touches to everything, and everything about her - from her hair to her tights to the stupid apron she’s wearing is causing your heart to pummel your bones and make you feel vaguely sick.

“Are you sure you don’t want some help?” you ask, crossing and uncrossing your legs, trying to get comfortable without seeming jittery.

“I’m sure,” she says, turning to shake her head at you. “Honestly, Bonnie, I’ve got this. I promise.”

She comes to the table with the steak, some salad, and dauphinoise potatoes and lays out the dishes carefully, her face unreadable. You shift again, and smile. “It smells amazing, Annalise.”

She sits down, smooths out her dress, and shrugs. “I’m just glad you’re not a vegetarian,” she says. “My salads only go so far.” Reaching over, she pours you a glass of wine, and for a while you’re both silent as you help yourselves to the food.

“Oh, my god, this is… this is incredible,” you say, and you mean it. You’ve never tasted anything like it, and you shake your head at her. “Is there anything you  _ can’t  _ do?”

She just smiles, watches you over the rim of her wine glass. “I’m not that good at desserts,” she says, quietly, like it’s a secret, and you grin.

“I’m not bad at that, actually,” you say. “I just always make way more mess than is necessary.”

She laughs, and you swear that you feel her foot brush up the side of your calf, before it’s gone. “Between us, we’ve got ourselves a full meal then,” she says, and you can’t help but shiver, noticing her wine reddened lips and how bright her eyes seem to be. She’s happy - genuinely so - and you decide that this is when she’s at her most beautiful. Not when she’s kicking ass in the courts, not when she’s with Sam, not first thing in the morning when she wakes up, but here. Now. When she looks at you like you’re the only thing in the world, when she throws her head back and laughs at something you say. You wish you could pause time and live in this moment forever.

She comes back to herself, tucks her hair behind her ear, and her foot is definitely resting against yours as you both finish your meal. The silence ebbs into smalltalk, and you’re not sure you even know what she’s saying, you’re so preoccupied with the sound of her voice and the undertones of this situation that are threatening to pull you under, and the fear that you’ll get carried away with the atmosphere and end up kissing her. And christ, how much you want to kiss her. She must know - must see. She must be flirting, there’s no way she’s not. Nobody has meals like this platonically, she doesn’t ever dress up like this to get nothing out of it, and you decide that you don’t care why she’s doing it; if she’s trying to seduce you, you consider yourself seduced.

 

You insist on helping her clear up, but she’s adamant that she’ll do the washing up tomorrow. You begin to protest, and she kisses you, her fingertips light under your chin and her lips soft and warm against your own. It costs you four extra heartbeats in one, but you kiss her back, your eyes closing and your hands shaking slightly as one curves around her waist and the other finds her hair, pushing it back as she backs you into the counter, kissing you and kissing you until you can think of nothing else but her and the way your body is responding to her, pressing towards her, seeking more of whatever it is she’s giving you. She pulls back slightly, just enough that you can feel her breath still on your lips, and you surge forward, kiss the side of her mouth and down her jaw, over her neck as she threads her fingers through your hair and guides you where she wants you.

You end up on your knees, your hands running up her thighs, and you barely have time to appreciate her before you’re taking her apart, her fingers tight in your hair, and you take your time, have her until your legs are numb on the cold tiles and your jaw is aching, and she’s nothing more than a trembling, whimpering wreck. Eventually, her hands find your shoulders and she pulls you to your feet, wraps her arms around you and kisses you, hard, and you’re dizzy with the taste of her, only half aware that she’s pulling you towards the stairs and up them, stopping periodically to hold you between herself and the wall and kiss you until you’re gasping, and then you’re falling onto her bed and she’s following, wasting no time in undressing you and covering every inch of you with kisses - going way beyond the call of duty, making sure that you can’t feel anything but the damp sheets beneath you, and everything that she’s doing elsewhere.

You lose count after the fourth time you come, after they all merge into one constant ache, and you become far more occupied with the way she looks when she comes apart, the way she spills from her clothes as you undress her, the way she gasps and her back arches and how she pulls the sheets so much that she untucks them, and the way she gasps your name, her hands always on you, pulling you closer, like she can’t get enough of you.

 

You fall asleep with her in a tangle of limbs and sheets, her arms tight around you and your head on her shoulder, breathing into her skin and for the first time in years you sleep through the night, and wake only when she stirs, draws you closer to her, and kisses your temple sleepily.

 

So you graduate from friend to lover, and you start getting used to waking up in her huge bed to slow kisses and a cup of coffee, and you find that you don’t even mind Sam’s returns home, even though it means you can’t stay over with her. But each time he passes you and touches the small of your back lightly, you look up and find Annalise’s gaze, and smile at her. You never thought you’d be somebody who sleeps with somebody who’s married, but nothing about it feels wrong. Sam doesn’t deserve her, and you think that you probably don’t either, but she’s giving herself to you, and you’re not an idiot. You’ll take it in a heartbeat - you’ve always known that.

 

You wake up one morning, curling tighter into the sheets and blinking your eyes open slowly, and she’s sitting at her vanity, putting her makeup on. You groan, stretch out, and sit up, dragging the duvet up too so you can wrap it around you and reach for the coffee to the side of the bed.

“Good morning,” she says, watching you through the mirror.

“Mm,” you mumble, bringing your knees up to your chest and sipping the coffee, trying to wake up a little more, a little easier. “No morning sex?”

She smiles as she puts on her lipstick, and you almost sigh wistfully, watching her do it. “As much as I’d love to, I think it’s probably more important that I pay the bills.”

You’re about to protest lazily, your fingers curling around the hot mug as you rub your eyes with your free hand, when you hear the front door close and footsteps on the stairs. Your stomach drops and you look at her for guidance, although you don’t know what it is you’d do. Hide in the bathroom? Climb down the drainpipe? Before either of you can say anything, the bedroom door opens, and Sam stands there, taking a second before he registers what he’s seeing.

“Really, Annie?” he says, looking between you and her, and you can see confusion give way to anger. “In our bed? While I’m away?”

You avoid his gaze, stare down into the black depths of the coffee that she’d made you, and wish that he would disappear.

“Don’t pretend you’re any better,” Annalise says smoothly, standing and putting herself between you and him. “At least Bonnie’s an adult, hm? But sure, go on, be mad that I had the sense to use the bed, when you’ve probably been awkwardly fucking in what? A car? Your office?”

He pauses, flounders, and then sneers at her, looks past her to you. “You’d really use Bonnie to get back at me?” he asks, and you’re about to react, to tell him that the only person who would be low enough to fuck somebody for some kind of upper hand is him, but Annalise gets there first.

“If you’re stupid enough to think that that’s what this is, you’re welcome to continue,” she says, coldly. “But I don’t think I’d expect anything else from you. You, who wouldn’t know how to love if somebody wrote a step by step manual. Now, can you get out? We’ve got to finish getting dressed.”

He realises that there’s no way he can get out of this one, and is about to leave when Annalise walks after him.

“I wouldn’t bother unpacking that suitcase, either,” she says, holding the door ready to close it. “I’ll pack your other things and let your sister know you’re on your way over.”

You hear him call her a bitch, and you can’t bring yourself to feel badly about the slight waver in his voice.

“If you think I want to live with you anymore you’re wrong,” he’s saying, fishing around for something that’ll hurt, growing more frustrated with every deflection.

“I’m glad we agree on this,” Annalise says, and then she’s shutting the door and neither of you move until you hear the front door slam shut.

You’re about to speak, to apologise, offer some kind of compromise or excuse when she crawls onto the bed, takes the coffee from you and sets it down before she pulls you into her arms, her hands cold against your bed-warmed skin, and keeps you close to her. Your lips are pressed against her neck as you listen to her tell you that she loves you, that she wouldn’t want this to work out any other way, and you let her talk until she runs out of ways to reassure you that she’s not using you, and you kiss her, telling her wordlessly that you do, you believe her. How could you not?

**Author's Note:**

> title from sorrow - iamx
> 
> also shout out to alex and becky who helped me think of fancy meals, because they are infinitely more cultured than me (and are richer than me too... seriously, who eats potato like that??)


End file.
